Many members of the mainstream scientific community react with extremehostility when presented with certain claims. This can be seen in theiremotional responses to current controversies such as UFO abductions, ColdFusion, cryptozoology, psi, and numerous others. The scientists react notwith pragmatism and a wish to get to the bottom of things, but insteadwith the same tactics religious groups use to suppress heretics: hostileemotional attacks, circular reasoning, dehumanizing of the 'enemy',extreme closed-mindedness, intellectually dishonest reasoning, underhandeddebating tactics, negative gossip, and all manner of name-calling andcharacter assassination.

Two can play at that game! Therefore, I call their behavior "PathologicalSkepticism," a term I base upon skeptics' assertion that variousunacceptable ideas are "Pathological Science." Below is a list of thesymptoms of pathological skepticism I have encountered, and examples ofthe irrational reasoning they tend to produce.

(Note: all the quotes are artificial examples)

1. Belief that theories determine phenomena, rather than the reverse.

"The phenomenon you have observed is impossible, crazy stuff. We knowof no mechanism which could explain your results, so we have gravesuspicions about the accuracy your report. There is no room for yourresults in modern theory, so they simply cannot exist. You areobviously the victim of errors, hoaxers, or self-delusion. We neednot publish your paper, and any attempts at replicating your resultswould be a waste of time. Your requests for funding are misguided,and should be turned down."

"I'll believe it when 'X' happens" (but when it does, this immediately is changed to: "I'll believe it when 'Y' happens.")

Example:"I won't believe it until major laboratories publish papers in thisfield. They have? That means nothing! Major labs have been wrongbefore. I'll believe it when stores sell products which use theeffect. They do? That means nothing, after all, stores sell magichealing pendants and Ouija boards. I'll believe it when a NobelPrize winning researcher gets behind that work. One has? Wellthat means nothing! That person is probably old and dotty likeDr. Pauling and his vitamin-C..." etc.

3. Belief that fundamental concepts in science rarely change, coupledwith a "herd following" behavior where the individual changes his/heropinions when colleagues all do, all the while remaining blind to thefact that any opinions had ever changed.

"The study of (space flight, endosymbiosis, drillcore bacteria,child abuse, cold fusion, etc.) has always been a legitimatepursuit. If scientists ever ridiculed the reported evidence ortried to stop such research, it certainly was not a majority ofscientists. It must have been just a few misguided souls, and musthave happened in the distant past."

4. Belief that science is guided by consensus beliefs and majority rule,rather than by evidence. Indulging in behavior which reinforces thenegative effects of consensus beliefs while minimizing the impact ofany evidence which contradicts those beliefs.

"I don't care how good your evidence is, I won't believe it until themajority of scientists also find it acceptable. Your evidencecannot be right, because it would mean that hundreds of textbooksand thousands of learned experts are wrong.

5. Adopting a prejudiced stance against a theory or an observed phenomena without first investigating the details, then using this asjustification for refusing to investigate the details.

"Your ideas are obviously garbage. What, try to replicate yourevidence? I wouldn't soil my hands. And besides, it would bea terrible waste of time and money, since there's no question aboutthe outcome."

6. Maintaining an unshakable stance of hostile, intolerant skepticism,and when anyone complains of this, accusing them of paranoid delusion.Remaining blind to scientists' widespread practice of intellectualsuppression of unorthodox findings, and to the practice of "expulsionof heretics" through secret, back-room accusations of deviance orinsanity.

"You say that no one will listen to your ideas, and now the fundingfor your other projects is cut off for no reason? And colleaguesare secretly passing around a petition demanding that you beremoved? If you're thinking along THOSE lines, then you obviouslyare delusional and should be seeking professional help."

7. Ignoring the lessons of history, and therefore opening the way forrepeating them again and again.

"Scientists of old ridiculed the germ theory, airplanes, spaceflight, meteors, etc. They were certain that science of the time had everything figured out, and that major new discoveries were nolonger possible. Isn't it good that we researchers of today are muchmore wise, and such things can no longer happen!"

8. *Denial* of the lessons of history. An inability to admit that science has made serious mistakes in the past. Maintaining a beliefthat good ideas and discoveries are never accidentally suppressed byclosed-mindedness, then revising history to fit this belief.

9. Using circular arguments to avoid accepting evidence which supportsunusual discoveries, or to prevent publication of this evidence.

"I do not have to inspect the evidence because I know it's wrong.I know it's wrong because I've never seen any positive evidence."

"We will not publish your paper, since these results have not beenreplicated by any other researchers. We will not publish yourpaper, since it is merely a replication of work which was doneearlier, by other researchers."

10. Accusing opponents of delusion, lying, or even financial fraud, where no evidence for fraud exists other than the supposed impossibility ofevidence being presented.

"Don't trust researchers who study parapsychology. They constantlycheat and lie in order to support their strange worldviews. Veryfew of them have been caught at it, but it's not necessary to doso, since any fool can see that the positive evidence for psi canonly be created by people who are either disturbed or dishonest.

11. Unwarranted confidence that the unknown is in the far distance, not staring us in the face.

"Your evidence cannot be real because it's not possible thatthousands of researchers could have overlooked it for all theseyears. If your discovery was real, the scientists who work in thatfield would already know about it."

12. Belief that certain fields of science are complete, that scientificrevolutions never happen, and that any further progress must occuronly in brushing up the details.

"Physics is a mature field. Future progress can only lie inincreasing the energies of particle accelerators, and in refiningthe precision of well-known measurements. Your discovery cannotbe true, since it would mean we'd have to throw out all our hard-won knowledge about physics."

"It is right that new discoveries be made to overcome largebarriers. That way only the good ideas will become accepted.If some important discoveries are suppressed in this process, well,that's just the price we have to pay to defend science against thefast-growing hoards of crackpots who threaten to destroy it."

14. Justifying any refusal to inspect evidence by claiming a "slipperyslope." Using the necessary judicious allocation of time and fundingas a weapon to prevent investigation of unusual, novel, or threateningideas.

"If we take your unlikely discovery seriously, all scientistseverywhere will have to accept every other crackpot idea too, andthen we'll waste all of our time checking out crackpot claims."

15. A blindness to phenomena which do not fit the current belief system, coiupled with a denial that beliefs affect perceptions.

"Thomas Kuhn's 'paradigm shifts' and sociology's 'cognitivedissonance' obviously do not apply to average, rational scientists.Scientists are objective, so they are not prone to the psychologicalfailings which plague normal humans. Scientists always welcome anydata which indicates a need to revise their current knowledge. Their"beliefs" don't affect their perceptions, scientists don't have"beliefs", science is not a religion!

16. A belief that all scientific progress is made by small, safe, obvioussteps, that widely-accepted theories are never overturned, and that nonew discoveries come from anomalies observed.

"All your observations are obviously mistakes. They couldn'tpossibly be real, because if they were real, it would mean thatmajor parts of current science are wrong, and we would have torewrite large portions of we know about physics. This neveroccurs. Science proceeds by building on earlier works, never bytearing them down. Therefore it is right that we reject evidencewhich contradicts contemporary theory, and recommend that fundingof such research not be continued."

17. Hiding any evidence of personal past ridicule of ideas which are later proved valid. Profound narcissism; an extreme need to always be right, a fear of having personal errors revealed, and a habit ofsilently covering up past mistakes.

" X is obviously ridiculous, and its supporters are crack-pots who are giving us a bad name and should be silenced."

But if X is proved true, the assertion suddenly becomes:

"Since 'X' is obviously true, it follows that..."

18. Belief in the lofty status of modern science but with consequentblindness to, and denial of, its faults. A tendency to view shamefulevents in the history of modern science as being beneficial, and alack of any desire to fix contemporary problems.

"It was right that Dr. Wegner's career was wrecked; that he wastreated as a crackpot, ridiculed, and died in shame. His evidencefor continental drift convinced no one. And besides, he did notpropose a mechanism to explain the phenomena."

19. A belief that Business and the Press have no tendency towards close-mindedness and suppression of novelty, and that their actions arenever are guided by the publicly-expressed judgement of scientists.

"If the Wright Brothers' claims were true, we would be reading aboutit in all the papers, and flying-machine companies would bespringing up left and right. Neither of these is occurring,therefor the Wright's claims are obviously a lie and a hoax.

20. Refusing to be swayed when other researchers find evidence supporting unconventional phenomena or theories. If other reputable people change sides and accept the unorthodox view, this is seen as evidence of their gullibility or insanity, not as evidence that perhaps theunconventional view is correct.

"I'll believe it when someone like Dr. P believes it."

But when Dr. P changes sides, this becomes:

"Dr. P did some great work in his early years, but then he destroyedhis career by getting involved with that irrational crackpotstuff."

21. Elevating skepticism to a lofty position, yet indulging in hypocrisyand opening the way to pathological thinking by refusing to ever casta critical, SKEPTICAL eye upon the irrational behavior of scoffers.

"Criticizing skeptics is never beneficial. It even represents adanger to science. One should never criticize science, it justgives ammunition to the enemy; it aids the irrational, anti-sciencehoards who would destroy our fragile edifice."

22. Belief that modern scientists as a group lack faults, and thereforeclinging to any slim justifications in order to ignore the argumentsof those who hope to eliminate the flaws in Science.

"I think we can safely ignore Thomas Kuhn's STRUCTURES OF SCIENTIFICREVOLUTIONS. Despite his physics training we can see that Kuhn wasan outsider to science; he obviously doesn't have a good grasp onreal science. Outsiders never can see things in the proper positivelight, it takes a working scientist to see the real situation.Also, he stressed his central themes way too much, so I think we canignore him as simply being a sensationalist. And besides, if he'sdigging up dirt regarding science, then he must have a hidden agenda.I bet we'll find that he's a Christian or something, probably acreationist."

23. Blindness to the widespread existence of the above symptoms. Beliefthat scientists are inherently objective, and rarely fall victim tothese faults. Excusing the frequent appearance of these symptoms asbeing isolated instances which do not comprise an accumulation ofevidence for the common practice of Pathological Skepticism.

"This 'Pathological Skepticism' does not exist. Kooks and crackpots deserve the hostile mistreatment we give them, butanyone who does similar things to skeptics is terribly misguided.Those who criticize skeptics are a danger to Science itself, and wemust stop them."

Absolutely fantastic. Exactly the sort of thing I keep banging on about only put across a lot better.

_________________Northern Ghost Investigations - Messing around with things we don't understand since 2005

Jay

Post subject: Re: Pathological Sceptism?

Posted: Mon Jul 06, 2009 11:32 am

The Ferryman

Joined: Sun Jul 09, 2006 10:28 pmPosts: 10488

Ditto. Don't exactly agree with all 23 .. and some I agree with every fibre of my being ..

To all the Pathologicals out there .. .. there is nothing wrong with sceptism .. but there are so many sceptics out there who will have the vast majority of those 23 points attached to them .. thats not good.

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 2 guests

You cannot post new topics in this forumYou cannot reply to topics in this forumYou cannot edit your posts in this forumYou cannot delete your posts in this forumYou cannot post attachments in this forum